Dadabhai Naoroji

Dadabhai Naoroji (4 September 1825-30 June 1917) was the British Liberal Party MP for Finsbury Central from 1892 to 1895, succeeding Frederick Thomas Penton and preceding William Frederick Barton Massey-Mainwaring. He was the first Indian to be a British MP.

Biography
Dadabhai Naoroji was born in Bombay, British India in 1825, and he became a professor of mathematics in 1854. He was an ardent social reformer, promoting women's education and criticizing the caste system. He went to London in 1855, and subsequently shuttled back and forth between the two countries. He was teh first Indian to be appointed professor at the Elphinstone College in Bombay, and in 1856-66 was professor of Gujarati in the University College, London. He worked tirelessly for better British understanding of India, founding the British India Society in 1865, over which he presided until 1907. He was a founding member of the Indian National Congress, whose president he was in 1886, 1893, and 1906. He was also the first (Liberal Party) MP in Britain (1892-5), sitting for Finsbury, to represent the case of India at Westminster. To this end, he gave evidence to a variety of Royal Commissions, and was himself Member of the Welby Commission from 1897. Known as "the Grand Old Man of India", he was one of the outstanding Indian public figures from 1845 to his death.